A short shaft with a fitting at one end shaped to facilitate use in putting a line over a piling, recovering an object dropped overboard, or in pushing or fending off. A wood pole with a metal hook and prong at one end; sometimes with two hooks. A yacht's gig has two boat hooks-one for the use of the bowman, another for the stroke; by these means a boat is held alongside the stops of a jetty or by the gangway of a vessel.